They related to me cruel and deplorable incidents in the everyday life of the streets.
“One afternoon,” said my host, “I was sitting peaceably in a street-car, when I was suddenly conscious of an altercation between the conductor and a coloured man. The absolute rights of the matter I don’t know, but it had somehow arisen out of a recent modification of the ‘transfer’ system, which the coloured man probably did not understand. I had scarcely realized what was happening, before men were standing on the seats of the car, shouting, ‘Kill the d——d nigger! We’ll all stand by you! All Virginia is behind you!’ The motor-man detached the heavy brass handle by which he works the car, ran up to the negro, and had actually raised it to strike. I interposed, and told the man that, if anything happened, he would get into trouble for leaving his post. He replied: ‘The nigger’s abusive,’ but sullenly went back to his platform.”
“Was the nigger abusive?” I asked.
“I don’t know. I didn’t hear him say anything; but it is quite possible that he had been ‘sassy.’ All I know is that he stood his ground like a man, with that yelling crowd around him.”
“And what happened?”
“Oh, the thing blew over. The negro walked away, and the crowd dispersed. As I took my seat again in the car, the man next me said, ‘If that had happened in South Carolina, he would have been a dead nigger.’”
“Not long ago,” my hostess said, “I was in a crowded street-car. |Street-Car Episodes.| A black woman with a baby got in, and had to stand. You know how our Washington cars are constantly rounding corners; and at every curve the woman was nearly thrown from her feet. Presently one of two white shop-girls who were sitting near her rose and gave the mother her place. The two girls soon after got out; and as they passed me, the one who had kept her seat said to the other, ‘I wonder you would do such a thing!’ ‘Didn’t you see she had a baby?’ the other replied; so, after all, we are not quite without humanity.”
“But tell about the two boys,” my host put in.
“Oh, that was two or three years ago. I noticed in a street-car a very distinguished-looking old man with two boys of about fourteen and twelve, evidently his grandsons. I thought what very nicely-mannered boys they were. A white woman got in, and, the car being full, the elder boy rose and gave her his seat. Immediately after, a mulatto woman got in, very well and quietly dressed—entirely a lady in manner and appearance. The younger boy was rising to give her his seat, when the elder pushed him down angrily, saying quite aloud, ‘I thought you knew better than to get up for a nigger.’”
“Did the lady hear?”